


Love Me Deaf-initely

by wordsarelifealways



Category: SKAM (Norway)
Genre: Alternative Meeting, Deaf Isak, M/M, Sign Language, Tags will be added as story goes on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-30
Updated: 2018-06-30
Packaged: 2019-05-31 05:43:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15113006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordsarelifealways/pseuds/wordsarelifealways
Summary: Isak is a tired uni student who teaches NSL around getting his degree, and one night his world is turned upside down when the prettiest boy he's ever seen walks into his beginner's class.





	Love Me Deaf-initely

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea how long this AU will be (I'm thinking less than 10 chapters) but I love love love deaf!Isak AUs so much and I've finally been inspired to write my own so here it is!
> 
> the signing will be based on my experience with BSL so forgive any discrepancies between that and NSL!

Sometimes Isak regretted deciding to teach sign language.  Other times, he absolutely loved it.

It all depended on his group of students; they had the ability to make or break his feelings on it.  Straight away it was easy to tell the people who genuinely wanted to learn as opposed to the ones coming for a laugh.

The ones who came in asking Isak how to sign swear words and making crude gestures and generally just made the whole group uncomfortable until Isak held his finger up for their attention and wrote on the whiteboard that they could leave his class without getting their money refunded, thank you and goodbye.

The ones who really wanted to learn, though?  They made it totally worthwhile.  He loved learning their reasons for learning to sign and watching them get increasingly more confident as the sessions went by.  Isak’s last beginner group had just had their exam and moved onto the next module, so tonight Isak had a _new_ beginner group.

He had his room all set up how he liked it: eight relatively comfortable chairs in a semi-circle with his own chair in front of them, and his big whiteboard on the stand next to him with the electronic whiteboard a little further back.  It was a nice enough room in a local multipurpose building that was rented to the company Isak worked for at a discounted price because the owner had a daughter who was deaf and thought more people should have access to signing lessons.

There was a nice late night cafe next door as well, which made Isak very happy as he ran his NSL class from 19.00-21.00 Monday’s (his beginner group) and Thursday’s (his almost fluent group) and had a terrible snacking habit in the evenings after being at uni for most of the day.  If he was honest a good 15% of his wages probably went straight into that cafe, unlike the other 75% that Isak spent on rent and proper food and dutifully put into his savings.

He was fiddling around on his phone waiting for his new group to trickle in and slowly but surely they found their way.  Isak gave them all a smile when he realised they were there (it wasn’t like he could hear their footsteps approaching, and they had been told when they signed up that their teacher was deaf) and beckoned them up to the whiteboard to write their name under his.  Once he got their name he ticked them off his little register and let them go sit down.

It was just after 19.00 when the last member of his new group arrived, seemingly in a hurry, and he didn’t even notice Isak’s whiteboard as he dashed in and sat down.  Isak tucked his phone safely in his back pocket before he stood up and went over and tapped the last student on the shoulder, pointing to the board and holding the pen out for him to take, but when the guy looked up Isak couldn’t stop his eyes widening.

He had the sort of face that Renaissance artists probably saw in their dreams and hair that put James Dean to shame.

Isak’s brain totally short circuited.

Thankfully one of the other students seemed to realise that Isak’s brain had melted at the sight of such an attractive man and said something to the guy and pointed to the whiteboard behind Isak.  That was what made Isak snap himself out of his daze: the fact he hadn’t even been paying attention to read her lips.

He was meant to be their teacher and the first impression he was making was as a slack jawed idiot.  He gave himself a mental shake down as he handed his Adonis of a student the board pen and he went back to his seat hoping that a little distance would make things easier.

His plan quickly backfired when the boy came up to the whiteboard _right next to Isak’s chair_.  He bent over to write his name – probably even an inch or two taller than Isak himself which was a rarity for him – and Isak’s nose was caressed by the rich scent of the boy’s cologne.

 _Fuck_.

Isak took his pen back and looked at his now complete list of names and matched them all up to his register, and once he was happy everyone was there he tossed the register onto the desk.  He pointed to the first name and then at the person who had written it to make sure he had it right, and she smiled and nodded so he wiped her name off with the eraser.  He made his way down the list without any mistakes, and he was embarrassed to feel his heart flutter with excitement as he got to the last name.

 _Even_.  The presumed model he was about to teach was called Even.

Even gave him a grin and a cheesy thumbs up when Isak tapped his name and then pointed to him and Isak rolled his eyes, but he let out a breathy little laugh through his nose as he swiped Even’s name off the board.

He turned back to the class and sat down, letting himself fall into his normal first lesson routine.  He introduced himself, finger spelling his name out slowly for them before pointing to his own name on the top of his whiteboard, and was happy to deduce that no one in this group seemed like they had come to dick around and waste his time.

He spent the evening teaching the most basic of basic signs: simple greetings, please/thank you/sorry, and finger spelling.  He carefully wrote all 26 letters of the alphabet on his whiteboard and pointed to each letter before showing them how to finger spell it, watching them all copy the sign to be sure they had it right.

He had one left handed person in his group, which hadn’t happened in a while, and he enjoyed having to stretch his brain a bit to work out how their sign should look with a different dominant hand to him, but that was about as challenging as his evening got.

He was happy to say that everyone seemed to be trying hard to remember each letter, and as usual they had to keep working on vowels because people were getting their fingers wrong, but unlike other lessons when he had been sure he was going to have to bash his head against the wall to get his frustrations out he found himself frequently enjoying the cute look of deep concentration on Even’s face.

At 19.50 he gave them the sign for _break_ before writing it on the board as well, and everyone seemed relieved to get a rest.  Remembering that it was their first lesson Isak also added underneath: _20 minutes, café next door very nice_ in case anyone else was in need of sustenance.  He gave his new group a little wave before he grabbed his wallet and jacket off the table and headed out into the brisk October evening.

He was aware of a few students getting up to leave, and when he noticed that one of them was Even he tried not to get excited.

 _Cool it_ , he chided himself as he jogged down the stairs and out the door, hoping the cold air outside would help clear his head.  It wasn’t the first time that Isak had taught someone he thought was attractive, but it was definitely the first time he had ever met someone who could honestly have been a runway model.

It was almost too much for his tired gay heart to handle.  Knowing his luck Even was probably as straight as a syringe needle and already taken by some equally beautiful girl that Isak already had an irrational dislike of.

As he hurried to the next door along and got himself inside the cosy warmth of the café he tried not to think about how everyone around him was in a relationship while he was still single and suffering.  He grabbed a panini from the fridge display and got himself a place in the line, feeling increasingly bitter about his shit luck on the dating scene.

To make matters worse the girl who usually worked Monday nights wasn’t behind the till, which meant that she didn’t know Isak took a large black coffee and his panini to go, and Isak was going to have to endure an incredibly stilted conversation with a hearing person.

He tucked his panini under his arm and fumbled his phone out of his pocket, opening the note app and quickly typing out what the _usual_ girl would already have known.

_Sorry, I’m deaf.  This panini and one large black coffee to go please._

Isak was so engrossed in his setback that he didn’t notice Even come into the café; although he felt the sudden cold breeze that wafted in when the door was opened he just didn’t think anything of it.

He got to the front of the line the girl smiled tiredly at him from behind the till.  Isak watched her face morph into confusion as he held his phone in her face, but as she flicked her eyes over his sentence understanding dawned.  He took his phone back and she held her hand out for the panini, which Isak gave her gratefully, and after scanning it she passed it to someone else who Isak watched unwrap it and shove it in the mini-oven.

When he looked back at the girl she pointed down at the card machine and – after checking that it was the same total as usual – Isak pushed his card in.  Once he had paid he took his receipt and signed _thank you_ to the girl before moving down to the end to wait for his order to be ready.

That was when he noticed Even, just a few people behind where he had been in the line.  Isak had no idea whether Even had noticed _him_ or not, but it didn’t really matter because Isak was totally captivated watching Even talk to the guy who was waiting for Isak’s panini to be done.  They both seemed very animated for the time of night, and Even had a huge grin on his face that made it impossible for Isak to even attempt to read his lips.

Not that Isak was a big fan of reading lips to begin with.  But part of him desperately wanted to know what Even was talking about with the boy behind the counter that he was obviously friendly with, wanted to know what was making Even laugh and smile like that.

 _Stop it_!  Isak wrenched his eyes away from the beautiful boy and instead looked around the café to try to make it less obvious that he had been blatantly ogling a student.  It didn’t matter that Even seemed pretty close to Isak’s age, probably early 20s; he was still Isak’s _student_ and Isak just didn’t want to mix business and pleasure like that.  Not when he was the one who was going to be doing Even’s intro exam in two months.

 _Maybe after that_ , Isak found himself thinking hopefully before he mentally slapped himself so hard that he actually jerked his head back.

He really needed to get a fucking grip.

Sure he hadn’t got laid in a fucking long time and his last attempt at seeing someone had ended disastrously when they told him they just couldn’t be bothered with the effort of communicating with someone deaf when he didn’t speak NSL and Isak refused to speak orally and wasn’t very good at reading lips, and _sure_ Even looked like he had walked directly out of one of Isak’s favourite fantasies, but that was no reason to fixate on the guy so much.

It just wasn’t appropriate, and it _definitely_ wasn’t cool of him.

He was pulled out of his self-lecturing by someone tapping him on the shoulder and he looked over sharply only to be greeted by the sight of his current crisis.  Even gave him a gentle smile and handed him his to go cup and wrapped up panini and all Isak could do was try not to gape at him.

Since when did a pretty face turn Isak’s brain to complete sludge?  He clearly needed a good jerk off session to get all this tension out otherwise he’d be rendered completely useless.

Isak took his order and gave Even the _thank you_ sign in a daze before hurrying around him and out of the café.  He went back into the multipurpose building and to his familiar little room to see out the last ten minutes of their break without actually having a break down.

 _Eskild was right_ , Isak realised bitterly as he ate his panini, _I am in a funk_.  He chugged some of his coffee – ignoring how blistering hot it was – before getting the attention of the class again.

They spent the rest of the evening continuing to get to grips with greeting each other and finger spelling, and near the end Isak got them to practice finger spelling their names to each other, things that Isak had been doing since he was a child and thankfully required little thinking on his part.

21.00 came soon enough and he dismissed the class, writing on the board that he’d expect them to finger spell their name at the start of the next lesson.  As usual everyone looked nervous at that, but they all started collecting their things without asking any questions so Isak started packing up too after signing _good night_.

When he turned around a few people were still getting their notes together – he personally wasn’t sure how people could learn sign by writing, Isak just found it more confusing that way – and his stomach clenched slightly when he found that Even was one of them.

Most of his students signed _good evening_ or _good night_ to him before leaving until it was just him and Even alone.  Isak licked his lips nervously and went back to tidying the room, but to his surprise Even helped him stack the chairs back against the wall.  When everything was back where it should be and Isak had shut down the computer Even was still there, and Isak wasn’t sure if the weird feeling in the room was tension or just awkwardness.

Either way: Isak’s heart flipped in his chest when Even gave him a small smile and signed _good night, Isak_ before turning on heel and walking out.

Isak was so screwed.

**Author's Note:**

> THOUGHTS??????? if you have any scenes you'd like to see in this let me know in the comments or hmu on social media ♥
> 
> [the blog](http://isaksredscarf.tumblr.com)   
>  [the twitter](https://twitter.com/isaksredscarf99)


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